🎉 Happy New Year! It’s the perfect time to spruce up your business, and we’ve got the ultimate checklist to help you refresh, reorganize, and reset for success. This is a replay of one of our very favorite episodes, #178 Spruce Up Your Business!
In this episode, we’re talking about:
Cleaning up your database, email, and digital files.
How to refresh your branding, headshots, and marketing materials.
The importance of setting routines, organizing your workspace, and creating efficient systems.
Easy ways to revamp your social media and client follow-up plans.
Why small changes can lead to big results in your mindset and business.
Whether you’re feeling overwhelmed or ready to tackle it all, this episode is packed with actionable tips to help you get organized and stay motivated. Take it one step at a time, and you’ll be amazed at how far you can go in 2025.

Leave us a review at RateThisPodcast.com/HustleHumbly

Get your FREE Database Template

Email Templates 101

Agent Systems 101

All Resources

Submit your topic ideas and toasts to Hello@HustleHumblyPodcast.com.

—————–
Rate, Review, & Follow on Apple Podcasts
“I love Katy and Alissa and The Hustle Humbly Podcast.” <– If that sounds like you, Click here,
scroll to the bottom, tap to rate with five stars, and select “Write a Review.” Then be sure to let us know what you loved most about the episode!

Also, if you haven’t done so already, follow the podcast. We’re adding a bunch of bonus episodes to the feed and, if you’re not following, there’s a good chance you’ll miss out. Follow now!

The following is a rough transcript provided by Otter.ai.

Alissa 0:00
Hi y’all welcome to hustle. Humbly. It’s Alyssa and Katie. And we are two top producing realtors in the Baton Rouge market. We work

Katy 0:05
for two different companies where we should be competitors, but we have chosen community over competition. The goal

Alissa 0:10
of our podcast is to encourage you to find your own way in business. So stop comparing

Katy 0:15
yourself and start embracing your strengths.

Alissa 0:18
Hello, Alyssa. Hey, Katie. Welcome

Unknown Speaker 0:21
to episode number 282,

Alissa 0:24
which is going to be spruce up your business. And this is one of my favorite episodes, okay, first of all, Happy New Year’s Eve. Eve, right? We realized that it is the holiday time, yeah, and not everybody is tuning in today, and we thought, spruce up your biz is one of our favorite episodes. There are so many good checklist items in here on things you can do to get your business ready for the new year. So why would we reinvent the wheel and try to create this like whole new episode that people may not even tune in for on New Year’s Eve? We don’t fault

Katy 1:00
you if you’re not here, no, if you are here, hi. Yeah, thanks. Hey, now you can learn, because look at the things in spruce up your biz are meant to be repetitive. Yes, it’s not like you. If these some, maybe a handful of things are a more one time, but most of them are like, what do we need to check on at the beginning of the year to, like, spruce things up. Yeah,

Alissa 1:21
so this will just be a great guide. Okay, it’ll be very helpful. Do

Katy 1:25
you have any specific sprucing planned this coming? You’re just, you just, you just had to struggle with some sprucing when you had to change your email, yeah,

Alissa 1:33
it’s been a whole thing. I’d have to get new business cards. I’m trying to just update all the things. So I’m have to do, I have to do a lot of sprucing right now. You’re just, yeah, you’re

Katy 1:45
deep in the weeds of sprucing. I am. I would also say that in this episode, you may begin to feel a bit overwhelmed because there are a lot of options. We’re not saying you need to do all of these things. No, no, no. Just make some priorities. Or it’s just kind of a nice, gentle reminder you maybe need to check on because you’re probably

Alissa 2:02
fairly slow right now, one would think so now is the time to take the two weeks to just get ready for busy. Yeah, get ready for things. Yeah. We also have that episode that’s that one’s

Katy 2:12
really good. And I think the other one that plays into this is the changing brokers one, because it gives you the whole list of like these things you have to do, yeah? For not changing brokers, it does go hand in hand, I think, with this, spruce up your biz, yeah, okay. For change, I think it’ll be a good

Alissa 2:30
motivational one. So even if you’re listening to this after New Year’s Eve, Eve, just anytime, any it’s great to get ready. Okay,

Katy 2:38
so happy 2025 I guess, yeah, I should have brought confetti.

Unknown Speaker 2:42
Mazel Tov,

Katy 2:47
hi, Alyssa. Katie, Happy New Year. Happy. New Year. 2023,

Alissa 2:52
and this is the perfect episode.

Katy 2:53
This is the perfect episode. This is literally, it’s January 2 today, so for like, first Monday of the year, everything is set back to zero, no pressure at all. It’s like, it’s like, the height of pressure.

Alissa 3:09
I know it’s like every realtor’s worst nightmare. Well, I survive another year. You

Katy 3:13
will. You do it. And you know what’s the worst part about it? Real Estate, historically, is the slowest in,

Alissa 3:21
like, January and February, yeah? And you think, I’ll never sell another house, yeah, New Year.

Katy 3:25
But you’re like, My life sucks. Nobody wants to buy a house. Nobody’s around. Like, it’s just

Alissa 3:33
Christmas is over. I have nothing good right

Katy 3:35
now, not right. I know it’s so bad. Did I say it’s episode 178 Okay, spruce up your business.

Alissa 3:41
This is we chose this topic on purpose. We surely

Katy 3:45
did. And, you know, maybe your house still smells like a spruce, literally. Maybe your tree is still up, you know, and they’re real dry and crunchy by now, so they smell like that’s when they turn to potpourri, like good though, yes, they smell great. Oh, the tree smells dried tree. The tree smells even better the longer and more dried out. It’s it is okay in your house. I I think we were just really excited, but I feel like I was looking at the recording lines, and they were like, way off the chart. Oh no. When you record a podcast, if you’re looking at the recording thing, it’s sort of like watching an EKG or something. It is. There are spikes and lol. And you’re like, I don’t know. Is this right? Is it not right? Well, Jay says it’s fine. He said it is fine, so we’re gonna go with it. Okay? I wanna thank first of all, first off, thank you to everyone who responded to the email that asked what they wanted to spruce up or revamp in their business this year. I was not prepared for the number of the sheer volume of responses so many emails, especially since I asked just the day before, because I don’t ever think to do it a week before, more advanced. So again, thank you. If you sent us your response, we I had a list already. It wasn’t like I needed the list. Content, yeah, but now we but list is so long now that I’m not really sure how long this episode is going to be, okay, and if it’s going to all make it, I’ll make the cut. Okay, so let’s just go and see, see what happens. How are you going to spruce up your business this year? Alyssa, well,

Alissa 5:16
my sprucing really starts in December. Okay? With the database clean up. I have to get all the addresses cleaned up so I can mail the Christmas cards. Yep. So now that we’re in January, I always feel good like, Okay, I have entered January with a clean database. I like to have a clean email. Yeah. Have you ever heard them say how you enter the new year laundry situation is going to be how your year is for your laundry situation, I’ve not ever heard so if you start the new year with a laundry room full of laundry, you may struggle with laundry all year. Oh my if you were I know I’m sorry that I’m telling you this two days late so you couldn’t be caught up on laundry last week, so that you could enter the new year. Laundry? Riveting, yes, well, they say you enter a new season, how you left the previous season. But how can

Katy 6:15
we, like, make a break exactly? Okay, that’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna be like, No, we’re

Alissa 6:19
gonna say, I don’t care that. It’s January 2, and my laundry room is full of clothes, laundry. Do it all right now, okay, but I don’t know, just like the tangible aspect of cleaning something out helps everything, like your mindset and your business. So we’re just going to jump into some ideas of things that you should be checking on, kind

Katy 6:38
of literally and metaphorically, clean stuff out. Yeah, I love that. Can we also quickly just talk about, if you’re like me and you now with your oldest one January 2 is not like the day Things are gonna like, hit the ground running. My kids are still on great. No, we have a whole week. I The Mine will go back Thursday the fifth, I think, whatever. And so then and then it’s the end of the week. Look, this week is a wash. Sure you know what this week’s for the laundry or for the thinking or for the like, packing up your Christmas. I think it is super frustrating, and you’re gonna, for sure, feel like a failure if you try to have a resolution that starts on January 1. I will

Alissa 7:20
say that even reading some of our listener responses, some of you out there are struggling with this, and you’re setting lofty goals, yeah, of things that maybe aren’t attainable, and now is a good time to just be reflecting on, like, what am I capable of doing long term, right? What am I capable of doing? Well, yeah, you have to do it well, or just don’t do

Katy 7:48
it. Oh, I really got that vibe from reading all the responses. It’s like, well, there’s a lot of things you can do, so many things. Some people’s lists were very long, like they actually thought I was going to reach out to Santa and get get them some, all kinds of things. And then sometimes I thought, oh, gosh, you know what, all you have to do is simplify. It’s just like social media platforms. There are a bajillion, right? You can be on 1023, pick two and be good, yeah. Then if you’re feeling like you’ve got that under control, add something else. But I think the problem is we try to do all these new things at once and spruce up every single thing in our business and do and then we’re like, oh, well, if I can’t get that all done first week of January, I’m just like, I’m out.

Alissa 8:30
And I know we just had our goal setting episode. This isn’t really about goal setting. This is about just tidying up your business cleaning How can

Katy 8:41
I in a messy environment?

Alissa 8:43
Well, they say, if you think you can, you’re actually not being as efficient, like there are people that embrace it and say, Well, this is just how I am. I’m just messy. But if they were in a clean area, they would be, they would be more productive. Yeah, it’s scientifically proven. Order produces results.

Katy 9:00
Order produces results. I love that. Okay, well, so you cleaned out your database. Me too. That part’s done. If you have a CRM though, like if you’re gonna make a list, and you need to clean that out. If you have an email list that’s separate of your database, and maybe you didn’t address that in December, it’s time to clean the list, right? Purge, purge, purge, don’t worry about adding right now. Just clean, clean them up. Make sure they’re all tidy. Good to go. What did you tell me? Order creates results? Yeah, I gotta put that on like a sign.

Alissa 9:33
So if you think you’re thriving in the chaos, just imagine how capable you would be in an orderly environment. You would be crushing it and crushing good, not feeling overwhelmed.

Katy 9:44
Okay, while we’re on things that are digital, that you need to revamp, update, spruce your email templates. Yes, now is the time if you own our email templates. Email Templates, 101, we updated them for you in December the. All fresh and ready to go. We only had to update five of them. Yeah, only five of them were market specific. They were talking about crazy market or whatever, but this is the time for you to go read them in general. Does it sound like you? Do you even use this one? Do you keep editing the same wording over and over again, then change the

Alissa 10:18
template? Yeah, re save it and have it ready to go. Because I feel like I change mine kind of frequently. Yeah, I like to change, like, what I bold, or what the colors are, or what I’m

Katy 10:29
saying, just a little spruce just a little spruce up. So those email templates are huge, and if you don’t have email templates, now’s the time to be like, what are the emails I’m sending most often? What do I feel like I’m answering like, what questions Am I answering over and over and over again? Those are your templates. Okay, next up, what are you gonna do? What are you gonna spruce now? So

Alissa 10:48
I really like to go through the notes section of my phone and just see what my random thoughts were that I wrote down, and make sure that they are either addressed or deleted and put appropriately. I feel like your digital footprint is probably super small.

Katy 11:07
I am a digital pack rat, so these are things I need to work.

Alissa 11:11
I know I seen our hustle humbly drive. It’s full. It’s being

Katy 11:15
cleaned up. It’s being cleaned up because I make a document for the thing, and then I do and then like, well, I want to get rid of the dog. You mean, what if I needed it? What if I need it again later? Yeah,

Alissa 11:24
I like to enter the new year with no photos on my phone, zero photos. So I make sure everything is uploaded to the Shutterfly album for 2022 so I can delete everything off my phone.

Katy 11:36
Wow, that is very spruced up. All you have to do is open the app and select all and I know, look, I know mineral. You want to know what’s crazy, my photos are all automatically going to my Google pictures. It’s like, I have to click the button. They’re there. I can delete them off my phone anytime. Okay, so it’s fine. And

Alissa 11:54
then if you want to find one, you just go to your Google Photos. Correct. Still, there. Super easy. I know people struggle with this.

Katy 12:01
It’s hard to let go. That’s it’s hard to let go this in the past. Now,

Alissa 12:04
let it go. Just let it go. And I like to have a tidy Trello.

Katy 12:08
Oh, tell us how you tidy your Trello. What do you mean? Sometimes,

Alissa 12:11
more specifically, in the active buyer columns, okay, I have found that that column builds up quickly, but then they weren’t as ready as I thought they were. Okay, that makes sense. But I don’t feel like they’re not ready enough to move them to the pipeline. But I don’t really want them under active, because you’re not active. So I kind of just say, Okay, enough is enough. New Year, I send one more email to just be like, hey, just want to let you know I know you’re taking a break, or, yeah, watching interest rates or whatever. I’m here if you need me, right? And then I’ll just move them to the pipeline. New prospect, yeah, prospect, I’m sorry, the prospect is the active stuff, yeah, prospects for later, yeah, that’s fine. And then you’ll remember to check in with them when you’re checking your prospects. Yes, I love

Katy 12:56
it. Yes. Okay, so just getting everything nice and tidy, maybe re following up with all of the pre listing people and being like, hey, hope you survived the holidays, right? I know you had mentioned y’all might need to make a move at a start. You need to catch everyone quick. You need to catch them quick. You need to get to them before they get to you or someone else, really. Okay, I like that. So those are my main things, photos, Trello database notes, all right, I also put in here. So we talked about updating your template, like your email templates, also your forms, not your office forms, but like the things you use to intake a buyer or your homeowner info sheet, something that you provide to your seller, like a fellow contact sheet or your contract info sheet. Go back and look at those things. If they’re not provided by your office or your board, are they? Do you use them? Do you not use them because you don’t like the way they’re set up? Are they part of them that you never use? And I don’t even care if they’re pretty, because, you know me, I’m like a black and white get the information done. But do you want them to be pretty fine. But more importantly, think about like, for instance, your intake form someone calls new lead, and you want to talk them through, like, their intake like, Hey, where are you looking? Go read that document again, and be like, I never reach for this because the questions are out of order, and it’s not a natural flow, and so I don’t use it. We’ll just reorder the questions right into your natural flow, like, how do you talk to someone on the phone? And then maybe when you format that form for its function, like, when you use it, you’ll be more likely to use it. Yeah, okay, so, like someone said they were sending out, like their seller contact info sheet, and they needed to fix it up because they felt like it wasn’t getting filled out, or they stopped using it. Well, it was asking things like, Do you have reserved items in your home? Or do you how? What do you? How do you want to handle showings? Or like,

Alissa 14:52
you’re not there yet? I’m like, Well, I mean, I think it was

Katy 14:55
at the beginning of the listing. But also like, maybe the better plan is to. Instead of having that be a form that they fill out, maybe you call them on the phone, or maybe that’s something you talk about, like, you add to your question list for your pre listing. Hey, is there anything in the house you plan to reserve? Like, that’s when I ask. Sure that way they don’t have to fill it out. And then it wasn’t basically, the form wasn’t working. I see they weren’t getting it fully filled out because it just wasn’t optimized. I see, optimize your forms,

Alissa 15:22
make sure everything makes sense and flows. Well, yeah, so optimize

Katy 15:25
your forms. That’s a good one. Okay, next up, a lot of people said this, and I completely agree, your headshots and your brand photos, plan them out, pre schedule them on the calendar. If you’re not a brand photo type of gal guy, then just plan one time in the year when you’re going to get a fresh photo, yeah, but if you want some like content and plan two, maybe three, you know, just depends on how you use them, but you need a fresh heads up head shot every year. I agree. Okay, then once you have your fresh heads up, why can’t I say

Alissa 16:04
headshot?

Katy 16:07
Where is it? Where is your picture on the huge worldwide web? It’s everywhere. It’s so many places, so many places that you don’t even know. And I’m not going to get into a like tangent on this, but so many websites you need to know where you are, and then when you’re ready to edit, you need a list of where you are, and so that you can go to all the places and edit your photo. It’s a great idea. So make a list of where you are. So this year, as you update your photo in all the places, make a list of all the places. I cannot tell you how many times someone has featured me, or sent me an email, or done something where I’m like, where did you get this photo? How did you find it so old? I’m like, can you just tell me so I can eradicate it from the web? I don’t know where it is. Tell me. Help me find it. So your headshot, okay, in line with that, your logo and your branding, maybe now’s the time you want to spruce it. But don’t spend six months. This is not that serious, and

Alissa 17:05
don’t spend $6,000 a month and days tweaking, tweaking, tweaking. This is just quick, quick things to get you ready. Your clients

Katy 17:14
don’t care if your colors are red and blue or purple and black. They don’t care. No, they don’t care. But you need to just pick and stick, let it, pick it, pick it, and stick with it, and then update it everywhere. Where are you on the world wide web with all of these colors? Yeah, are your Canva templates that you’re using? Change to what your new branding is? Just get it all consistent. You know what I think is the easiest to pick one color, yeah, like, what’s your color? Is it mint green? Great. Now, just use that to inform all of your stuff.

Alissa 17:43
This is my color. This is my color.

Katy 17:47
This is my color. And then it’s kind of easy to go through and check it in the logo again. Clients don’t care. They don’t care what your logo is. They don’t care if you have a logo. Just, just pick one you like or don’t. It can be your name. Can be your franchise logo, whatever. Just pick one, put it on your you know, list of this is what I’m using right now and be done with it, yeah. But a revamp doesn’t mean it has to cost you money. It’s not hard. I think Canva has delightful logo templates, yeah, stick your name in there and be done with it, yeah. But you can also get cheap ones on like Etsy or Fiverr or whatever. But again, don’t spend a lot of money or time. We’re just trying to, like, get it all consistent, yeah,

Alissa 18:27
and just make sure you like it and have it in all the same place, and you’re gonna use it right, like, and delete all the old ones. Oh, yeah. You don’t even need to do so, talking to myself, but then pull out all of your 20 year old logos and post you still have all you really

Katy 18:44
like that nostalgia piece of it. So I don’t have all my Well, I do have all my posts. I know you told me, but it’s okay. It’s okay, as long as it’s organized. It’s not chaos, it’s not like whatever we’re moving on, podcast therapy. Okay, fine, but now that you have your branding and your logo, check for your consistent branding across all the platforms and your marketing pieces, so your flyer, your business card, your you know, all your websites, all your social media platforms. Make it all the same, yeah,

Alissa 19:17
check your Google business account. Yes, like when people Google you and what happens? Do they see? It’s good to have a few photos there, like your picture, your logo, maybe your company logo. Are you

Katy 19:29
ready for me to blow your mind? We’re gonna probably do a whole episode on Google business. Okay? Your clients, when they input a review for you, can upload a photo.

Alissa 19:39
Oh, yes. So we need to get it like an instructional sheet for them. Yeah.

Katy 19:43
Do you know how I know this? How sweet, sweet. Anna Cornick, it’s about time. When I sold her house, we took it back. We took a picture out in her lawn by the sign. When she did my Google review, she uploaded the picture of us next to her sign. That

Alissa 19:57
is so cute. My mind was blessed. So we need to edit that template that says, Yeah, did you know that when you leave me a review on Google,

Katy 20:05
you can add a photo of you, your family at the house, us together, the closing, whatever. So good. I mean, that is next level. If

Alissa 20:14
someone I would like to get more Google reviews this year, that’s I know they’re super important, and I don’t I haven’t been getting, let’s do

Katy 20:20
a whole episode. Okay? Because I really want everyone this year to focus on their Google account, business account. It’s free. It’s the most functional. It works with you no matter where you are. All right, moving on. We’re gonna actually make an episode about that. I’m writing a note Google biz. Okay, stay tuned. What’s next? On your things you do,

Alissa 20:39
stocking up on items, like closing gifts, oh, yeah, or your buyer and seller folders, just having things freshened up and ready to go. If

Katy 20:50
you don’t have your folders ready, or you’re getting down low, I always like to have, you know, 10 of them ready, yeah, but I only do it once. It depends on what your volume is, right, sure, or if you’re using that process, but like, once a quarter or twice a year, I’ll just print a whole bunch of this stuff, get stuff it up and the folders ready, yeah, run out the door. The closing gift is great. Y’all. We do not have to spend our whole life deciding on closing gifts. No, I do the return address stamp. Some people have cute like candles and stuff. Just get 10 of them and stick it in the closet. That’s it. And you do the photo books. So I think that if you’re gonna do something like that, that obviously you can’t stock up beforehand on your photo book right for sellers, but what you can do is create a very quick like standard of practice. This is how you do the photo book, step 1234, that way, if you do hire an assistant, or if someone else is helping you, or if you just don’t, every time you’re having to rethink what you did, just make a little put it in your checklist. Yeah. So why do I do order

Alissa 21:49
this? Yeah. How do I get the photo book?

Katy 21:51
Like, figure it out. Okay, when you’re printing out your buy or seller folder stuff, I think now is the right time to spruce it up. Do you want to add a new flyer from a different vendor? Do you want to remove something like, I stopped kind of putting warranty brochures and a lot of mine, so I’m like, yeah, really, playing this game anymore? Yeah. So do you want to add a new photographer or maybe a mover? Maybe you updated 2023, resume, your new resume. That’s what you got to update right now. Okay, so your resume updated. Put in your folder, your vendor list, your vendor list, yeah. Make sure it’s up to date and looks nice. Looks good. Make sure that everyone is still like, in business. In business, I go through my vendor list probably every three or four months, because, without fail, someone’s like, oh, I tried to find blah, blah, blah, and that one wasn’t working anymore. I’m like, Okay, I need a new person that I’m like, Well, this is great. I never had a home organizer before, and I’ll throw it on there, yeah. So you always update that one, but now’s a great time to do it. Okay, when you’re updating your stuff on the web and you’re doing you need to do your bio updates. This plays into your resume. Use that for your resume. Help you inform your resume with your bio updates for your website and all the other places that you are. Yeah, you’re on social media, on Realtor apps, on what maybe you’re on. Zillow, gosh, so your bio, your bio is in so

Alissa 23:20
many places. Will you write my bio? Yeah. Do you want me to help you write your bio? Yeah. I just feel like I never have, like, a good one ready to go.

Katy 23:27
Why don’t we do that in our Google episode? Okay, great. Well, we’ll bio write that’ll be fun. Okay? Because a bio is is key, key and crucial. Oh, here’s a good one. What about your social media handles? Are they all the same? Do you have maybe old branding? Are you realtor Katie on one and Katie Baton Rouge on another? Like, are, are they all the same, right? If you meet someone and you want to share with them your social media handles, does it require you to say four different things? Or can you just say, Oh, I’m at Katie Caldwell everywhere you look. Do you know what I mean? Like, right? What is it? Yeah, okay, so, right, your name is always easy. It’s just my personal opinion. Okay, are they the same and are they up to date? Okay, what’s next? Alyssa, on your to do list? Oh, can I mention something really quick, as I was writing some of these things down, I’m like, Okay, I think you have a few buckets business assets are the things that belong to, like your branding, your resume, things, things that belong to your business, that you probably just deal with once, right then you have your business, like tracking and your setup so your budget, your business plan, you know, things that really aren’t part of like your business asset, okay, it’s not like a marketing it’s just we got to do this. And then I had intangibles, because there’s actually quite a long list of those. So we can keep going. But I just wanted to point out that the things you spruce up, some of them, are going to be once, and they’re like easy and you can make a list basically. These are my brand colors. This is my headshot. This is the assets of my business. This is what my business card looks like. And then some of it is going to be a little bit more, like, what’s my marketing plan? Or, like, what just not, it’s not a thing, sure. Okay, sense, all right, yeah, I’m sorry. Go on.

Alissa 25:15
Um, back to a thing, though. I like the thought of like, replenishing your stationary and making sure all of that is up to date now that you have maybe solidified your brand colors and just have plenty in stock. Business cards thank

Katy 25:31
you notes like, if you’re stationary, you can have two types, like a plane and a thank you. But if you’re gonna do thank yous, it doesn’t have to be branded to you, but if it is great, but if not, run over to the target, grab a few packs of thank you cards. Yeah, so easy. Cleaning out

Alissa 25:46
your car. Oh yeah, take me. Taking out car seats is like, oh, gosh, oh, gosh. I’m like for for not letting kids eat in the car. They’re sure a lot of food in

Katy 25:58
your failing. You’re like, if how your car into the year. Is how you head into the year. I’m in trouble. Thanks for not coming. Yes, well, yeah. And if you need to refill anything in your car kit, like if you’re carrying certain things around for work, like if you usually have a lock box in there, or light bulbs. Light bulbs are the number one thing I use out of my car kit. Interesting. Do you ever used light bulbs never okay. Maybe because I feel like I go to photos alone and I’m like, in vacant houses, and I’m like, I can’t take a photo with the light bulb out. That makes me crazy. Yeah? So just replenish the things you do carry. Yeah,

Alissa 26:32
whatever they are, I do like to try to enter with a as close to zero inbox as I can get. I’m working on it so hard right now. You’re doing a great job. Thank you. I think I’m really trying hard, hard, hard. Just keep on unsubscribing. You know, we just came out of Christmas, so you got a lot of happy New Year and Merry Christmas emails that you can just unsubscribe as they come through. Yeah,

Katy 27:00
I think that’s a great one. Just get it nice and clean. Overwhelmed email tidy. Oh, someone did say they were gonna update their email drip campaigns. So if you have, like, a CRM or something that’s sending automatic emails to your prospect, oh, yeah, update what the wording is. Sure. I mean, I don’t utilize that, but I have in the past, like, even at REMAX, they had all these great campaigns, but the wording is always like, right, not for you. No good. So you want to update those. Okay, okay, and your template for your newsletter, if you’ve decided you listen to that great newsletter episode, that episode was so good, so good. And can I tell you how many newsletters I have gotten from Realtors since

Alissa 27:43
then they want us to see their work so good.

Katy 27:47
So I think that if you are gonna do a newsletter, or have been maybe now’s the time you spruce up that template or create a template so it makes it easier. All these things we’re doing is supposed to just make it easier, right? Yeah, instead of me fussing around for an hour trying to find my logo. Yeah, it’s just in one place, and it’s updated and it’s good, or my headshot, or any of those things. Yeah,

Alissa 28:06
you need a headshot in the bio. Here you go. Here you go.

Katy 28:08
It’s right here. Easy peasy. Okay, how about equipment? Do you want to upgrade any equipment this

Alissa 28:15
year? You know, I saw I could probably use a new phone, but I don’t know that I will Okay.

Katy 28:21
Some people wanted a second monitor so they could work on, like, I guess, two things at once, computer monitor. Some people just wanted a new computer,

Alissa 28:30
new office, desk,

Katy 28:32
a desk. I love my up, down, standing, sitting, desk. Last year, I upgraded and got myself one of those sweet Treadmills for under the desk. Yeah, I’m trying to think some people want, like video equipment, or ring lights, or, you know, there’s lots of things you do spruce up your like your social media setup, or like you, like your handheld, your gimbal for taking video with your phone, all those things so you can spruce up your, your tech tech tools. Tech Tools, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, your email

Alissa 29:08
signature? Oh, that’s such a good one. Yeah. Maybe now that you have a new headshot, you could put it there with some pretty colors,

Katy 29:15
yeah? And like, what’s in your signature Are you? Do you have business hours or anything like that? You need to update. Okay? And like, if you’re doing an auto responder, or your voicemail,

Alissa 29:25
oh, your voicemail, that’s a good one. I have no idea what mine even says right now. Okay, well, now it’s time to spruce that up voicemail. Like,

Katy 29:32
you know what I want to say about making this list, because it’s already quite long, and I hope that no one is getting super overwhelmed, but take the things one day at a time. Yeah, you know, like, come back to this in another month and listen to it again and be like, Okay, I checked something off. Let me do something else. What I realized was that running a real estate business requires a lot

Alissa 29:52
of things, so many things like the that’s what, that’s what basically came

Katy 29:57
out of this. Yeah, the setup, it is. A small business, no doubt. And if people are like, what do Realtors do? I’ll be like, Look at all this stuff I gotta keep track of. Yeah, this is just stuff we have just to be I haven’t even started selling a house, right yet. I didn’t buy or sell a house at

Alissa 30:12
all yet. No, no, this has nothing to do with actually selling anything.

Katy 30:15
I’m just prepping my business, yes, like, I’m just having a business, just cleaning

Alissa 30:19
house, right? Exactly.

Katy 30:21
Okay. What about signs? And we talked about my signs are so dirty signs, okay, well, is it time for a new photo on your sign? Do you know how just dirty? Okay? Are they that you need to clean them up? So it’s time to clean your signs. Okay, then the website refresh. This is really something we let go for too long, yeah? Like, oh, I just ignore my website. It’s not doing anything Well, somebody can find it, right? And if it’s not accurate, doesn’t have a current bio. It says you’ve been selling real estate for two years, but it’s really been seven, yeah?

Alissa 30:52
Like, we gotta fix that, right? So update

Katy 30:55
your website, get it refreshed, work on your SEO, search engine optimization. If you’re going to and then, oh, so ironic. We just talked to Marky about this. Yeah, I had, and if you’re gonna have landing pages to collect emails, get that all set up. So there’s quite a few things that you can be doing to freshen up your website. Perfect. Okay, I also someone mentioned their branded merchandise. So like, if you have pins or cups or whatever, replenish that, or T shirts, what are you doing for your people? Okay, guess what? We finished the business assets.

Alissa 31:34
Okay, what a list that was. We’re 1/3 of the way

Katy 31:38
through deep breath. Everyone. Deep breath, business setup and tracking. Are you ready? We can breeze through these really quick okay, a way to track your transactions. Like, how are you recording your transactions? Hello, great, perfect. Thank you for answering if your business plan now’s the time to update it. Your Business budget. If you don’t have one, you need one. We need to know where the expenses are. Okay, here’s your business bank account. Do you have a business bank account? Yeah.

Alissa 32:07
How did your income look last year? It might be time to create an S corp or an LLC and just get all your things legalized for

Katy 32:15
the year, like or, very simply, what is your tax plan? Yeah. Where do you put that money when you’re saving it like you do need another account. What’s happening, right? Definitely be saving for taxes this year to that this year. Let’s do it now. Okay? And then your tech App Service, clean out, all right, unsubscribe from the things that you’re not using. There

Alissa 32:39
are so many apps you might be paying like, $1 a month for realizing I

Katy 32:43
have an exercise, one that I need to delete, and every month, when it charges me $10 I’m like, Oh no, and then I forget, like, what am I doing with

Alissa 32:51
my life? You’re not gonna use it.

Katy 32:54
I did, and I’m not okay. So then I’m like, I can always get it back. Yeah, that’s the thing. We just keep hanging on to stuff, thinking,

Alissa 33:02
Oh, maybe let it go. Just let it go. Hang on.

Katy 33:05
Also, even free apps, delete clean off your phone. Yeah, you don’t need it. If you’re not using, like, a nice, clean that digital footprint, we’re making a nice, clean, new

Alissa 33:15
background on your phone. I like that screen, okay,

Katy 33:19
so we’re gonna unsubscribe from the things you don’t use. Okay, okay, here’s a little more tangible in the business setup, clean your office and organize your desk. And whether that’s at home, your home office, or your brokerage like, let’s clean those spaces. Everything tidy and fresh. Yeah. And then in January, I always flip my files so like the things that are for my taxes each year, or whatever I’m saving, which is not a lot, but I’ve changed them to 2023 okay, I need to clean them out, and then I’m ready for my basically, I can be ready for taxes like that, lucky at the snap of a finger. So proud of you. Thank you. It really is an improvement. I want everyone who is not like that to know that 2019 is when I hired the accountant to do my bookkeeping and pay my payroll and do all the things. And it is worth every penny, every penny, because before that, it was a disaster, and I would like to curse about it, but I’m not going to

Unknown Speaker 34:15
Great, okay.

Katy 34:17
Oh, and then the last thing that I like in the tracking department is the numbers note, okay, so let me tell you what this is. I heard this on the gold digger podcast. No, you don’t have a numbers note, okay, I’ve done it for like, a year, maybe little over a year now, the beginning of the year, it’s okay. It’s January 2. It’s fine. Do it now, or tomorrow, or whenever I pull numbers like this, how many people are on your database? How many people are on your email list? How many followers do you have on social media if you’re focused on a particular app, yeah, how many buyer appointments did you go on last year? How many seller appointments? Your expenses, whatever you want

Alissa 34:58
to try. Check

Katy 35:00
that how much money is in your savings account. That is a rolling total. Okay, so it’s sort of a way to see how far you have come. Maybe I only have 100 social media followers, and then I check it every six months. So then I would go back on june 30 or July 1, and I would say, Okay, I have 300 followers now, wow, I’ve tripled. Oh, my God. Like, look at me. I’m so proud. So if you don’t or, like, I have 100 people on my email list. I only started with two. Yeah, none you have to know to celebrate your progress. But right, if those things that are things that are constantly building, yeah, we just sort of lose sight of the fact that you started at zero. Yeah, everything starts at zero. Everything. Maybe it’s just, I posted on my social media for, you know, every day for a, you know, a year, whatever it is, like everything starts at zero. Yeah, you have one follower. You in the beginning, right? That’s it. Maybe you didn’t even follow yourself. That’s a

Alissa 35:59
great idea. I have loved it. I have you really love progress. It is wild, yeah? So

Katy 36:07
I highly recommend a numbers note. I do it twice a year, but definitely at the beginning of the year. It’s just super nice to see how far you came, or maybe you’re keeping a running total of your transactions, yeah, like, because that doesn’t automatically just show up for you somewhere. No, like, you had five transactions of first year, 15, then 35 whatever. Well, all together, it’s like, all of a sudden, you’re like, wait a minute, I hit 400 Yeah, I didn’t even know. And thought, Who would have thought? All right, that’s all of the tracking department. Deep breaths, it’s gonna be okay. Are we ready for the intangibles?

Alissa 36:44
Yes, I

Katy 36:48
needed a sip of my tea. That’s a lot. All right, go. I need a break.

Alissa 36:55
I know this is just so much sprucing. There’s a lot to spruce it up as you enter the new year. Check your mindset. Yes. I mean, how’s your head space? Spruce it up. Is there a TV show you need to cut out that’s bringing you down in your mood? Are you follow somebody? Follow somebody? Are you getting enough sleep? That’s a good one. You know, going for walks like are you drink? We need to do drink your water to keep a running total of your water for the year. Oh my gosh. You could fill a pool for sure, at least a gallon a day, 303

Katy 37:33
65 gallons of water. It probably won’t fill a pool, but it would be no Anyway, okay, all right, but yes, put your mindset, what’s happening in your mind. Also, like, what’s your motivation? I made a note from someone sweets message that you need to figure out what you want to do versus what you think you need to do. Yes, like, just take stock, right? I don’t want to door knock, I’m not going to door knock. I don’t

Alissa 38:02
want to pick up the phone and call and ask for business. Yeah, but don’t, fine,

Katy 38:07
don’t, but do something else. Right? That’s the problem, I think, that we all have. Oh, well, they were only this person that I’m following said I had to door knock to be successful, and that’s how they were successful. And since I don’t want to door knock, I’m just not going to do anything, right? But you could have some killer texting campaign to your whole database that maybe someone else be like, I would never text my database. I would rather talk to strangers on a cold call. But Your vibe attracts your tribe, right? And it’s how you work. You have to work at something. You can’t just say I don’t want to do any of those things, then you do nothing. Well, okay, you have to pick, yeah, it is a job. You can’t you’re not going to attract any business by doing nothing, right? It’s like, physically impossible. Yes, they’re not gonna be like, Oh, I remember 10 years ago when you got your license, and I’ve always thought, Oh, you have your license. No. Most people won’t even remember. They

Alissa 39:01
don’t remember at all, no, at all. I was just at a friend’s house. I just met them, okay? And I went, I got invited to their little kid’s birthday party. So I brought the kids. And they just moved here from out of state, okay? And so I was like, Oh, I love your house. Like, who helped you buy it? And she was like, Oh, what was her name still no clue. And she was like, Um, no, thank you. And then she was like, uh, Susie, but I cannot remember her last name. And I’m like, I mean, she moved in, like, six months ago, so I guess she hasn’t heard from Susie in six months at least. Or is

Katy 39:39
she going to be able to contact her when she needs to move. No. Susie, who? Right? Susie, who you should have asked her how she worked with Susie. It was a reload thing. Yeah. Susie’s like, forget this. Reload is gonna send me another lead next week, right? I don’t need to follow up. I want to keep giving away 40% of

Alissa 39:57
my money. Wow.

Katy 39:58
I. Yeah, that’s very interesting. Yep, very interesting. Okay, so, yeah, we’re gonna think about, what do we want to do? Also think about, if you like posting on social media, and then you don’t for a while because you get busy, and then you’re like, Oh, I’m gonna start door knocking, because that’s what everyone says. But you love doing social media, and it was working, go back to that. Just go back to it. Just do one thing well. And if you do one thing really well, it will be enough. But you know, you can’t just do a little of everything poorly. All right, here’s another spruce up. Maybe it’s time to change your talking points or your scripts. For instance, if you’re using a script, I’m doing my air quotes, because we don’t script much here. But just simply, like, how do you respond to the question, how’s the market? Yeah, like, just maybe freshen up those talking points, right? How is the market? This is what’s going on. How can I just be educational and helpful when I’m asked that question and provide some value and like, if you don’t want to lie to lie to me, people like, oh, must be slow. Now, that must be terrible. And if you wanted to say, Yeah, you know, the market is a little bit slower than the past couple of years, but I’m loving the downtime to really freshen up my systems. Yes, would you like a free market report? Yeah, I’m doing time. Or, yeah, I’m doing so many extra market reports for my sphere because I have some time. Yeah, it’s great. I’m loving it. I’m able to provide so much more intentional service to my clients. Yeah, whatever you want to say, I don’t know, like, or

Alissa 41:27
I have been saying for the last year, listen, we just can’t write contingent offers. Now you can. Now I can change that talking point and get back to the familiar, like, listen, we may be able to be contingent. We need to figure out our plan, yeah,

Katy 41:41
hey, all those people, this sends a great email to send your database. Yeah, hey, everyone who’s thought about moving up. It was a little bit nervous because you knew the market was too crazy to even sell your house first, and you thought you now, guess what? You could actually find something you love and potentially buy, you know, put something under contract before you sell your house, right? Great

Alissa 42:02
news. You have some options. It’s so exciting.

Katy 42:04
It’s an exciting time. Yeah, okay, here’s another really good one. Maybe it’s time to revamp your routines. Morning Routine, shut down routine, how you handle your chores. You’re even like you’re just all the parts of your life, chores, someone said that their chores, Legion, admin, work and mom, life like, well, what’s the routine? How are we going to revamp our routines in the new year? You

Alissa 42:31
know what? I just started doing that is so helpful. What? So I usually wake up before the kids, and then I go wake up Haven. She is a bear to wake up, right? She’s so just not a morning person. When I get up before I even brush my teeth, I just walk to her room and I turn on like her her bathroom light, and open the door so there’s now like light in her room, yes, and then I go and get my teeth brush and all the things I normally do, but when I go back in there. It’s almost like she’s, her body is like, adjusting, yes, it’s like, when

Katy 43:04
there’s alarm clocks, yeah, me, you’re the alarm clock. Yeah, I love that, but

Alissa 43:09
it has been very helpful. What did you think of doing that? Because she was taking we were running late for school, and I was rushing like, I was like, come on, come on, come on. We got to go. And I was like, she needs more time, yeah, but I’m not getting up earlier, no. So I would just go in and turn on her light and then go get myself ready to give her time alone her little Jay. And rhythm, I was trying to let her sleep as late as possible. That wasn’t working, but she right because she but she’s better if she has more time to process. Okay, I love that. So that’s a new routine that we recently changed that, yeah, okay,

Katy 43:45
I like, you know, thinking about what you can combine, so you kind of just or reorder, you know, and I put in my notes, maybe instead of Legion or mom life, you’re doing both volunteer at school and meet more people and stay in front of your sphere while you’re spending time with your kid. I think that’s excellent. Like, how can we combine the things, right? You know, right? Then

Alissa 44:09
you’re adding, like, we, I added 25 people to my database in December just because of, like, their new teachers and classmates and making sure her friends get a Christmas card, you know, like all that is, but people think, Oh, I have to go do all these terrible, annoying things to meet new people. Like, no, it’s all overlaps. That’s the beauty of our job. Yes,

Katy 44:30
my other thought about revamping routines right now would be to actually get your calendar out and schedule things like your office day, make it a repeat. I mean, you know, you can adjust it, but make it a repeat.

Alissa 44:44
Yeah, office day would be a great episode to go listen to right now, because I feel like on Office days, those are kind of your many revamps that keep you organized in your business. Because you’re running a business, you’re running a business, so you’re doing this big overhaul at the beginning of. A year to get everything tidy, but then it can quickly get out of sorts. Yep,

Katy 45:04
I don’t. I, when you talked about the laundry, I kind of had to laugh, because I don’t. The laundry happens on Saturday, every Saturday, every bit of it, yeah, unless somebody like throws up, we’re not doing laundry out of turn. It’s all done. It’s all put away by Sunday. That’s it. Yeah, there’s no laundry on the other days because I can’t be the person who does laundry every day of the week, right? I just can’t. I

Alissa 45:28
don’t mind it. I can’t do I would rather do little chunks than dedicate hours than having a whole thing. Well, yeah, I usually do it on my either office day or day off where, like, office day is the best because when the timer goes off, that’s when I take a break I walk around. You know? Yeah,

Katy 45:46
I just think that maybe, if it works for you, try to theme your days. Do you want to work on your database every second Tuesday? Do you want to have meal planning every Monday morning? Do you want to do your laundry on a certain day. Is your office day? Always Tuesday. Like, take this time to be like, When can I do things I feel like

Alissa 46:08
coming off of the holidays. I am just not in a good routine with, like, planning ahead on meals and dinner. Yeah, I’m like, please eat a sandwich. I don’t know what we’re having. Wait.

Katy 46:17
I posted this meme, if you just wait long enough, everyone in your house will have cereal for dinner. Oh, yeah, follow me for more recipes.

Alissa 46:28
But it’s just like, so true. That’s been where I’ve been living. I need to get that back together. But it is a source of stress.

Katy 46:33
Yeah, it is. And then you don’t have what you need in the house when you do want to make something, and then you’re just like, oh, do some takeout. Yeah, just eat your sandwich or your cereal. I

Alissa 46:42
also moved the kids swim lessons time, oh, from 420 to 4pm okay, because I was leaving at five. It was anyway, terrible. It was terrible. So just that extra 20 minutes it happened. Yes, so look at you making changes. I’m like, Just give me 20 more minutes. Like, right? I can’t do 330 because that’s too early, yeah, but I could do 20 minutes early. Will help me beat that traffic. Very interesting. Just things like that. Okay, I

Katy 47:11
like that. Okay, all of the rest of these items are basically system plans. So I’m gonna just kind of go through the list things that you might want to revamp your system for.

Alissa 47:25
And I would like to preface this with saying, I don’t personally do a lot of these things you don’t have to do all and you don’t have, like, we’re not here to shut on you. No, these are not things that you should, should, should be doing. But if they’re things we’re just giving you options,

Katy 47:39
maybe now is the time to revamp one or let one go? Yeah. Okay. So for instance, the home anniversary plan. Do you mail something? What is it? Can you change it to a text instead of a card in the mail? Like, that’d be cute, like, a little text, like, so someone in the messages said, I’m having struggles keeping up with my home anniversary plan. Basically every, every past client on their home anniversary was getting a print out of the MLS listing, oh my gosh, a printed CMA and a handwritten note. Well, no wonder you’re having trouble. Yeah. And I’m like, well, that’s a snowball that builds Right? Like every year there’s more and more and I said, Hey, maybe you just still send them a note if you want, or send a text or an email that says, Hey, I can’t believe it’s your home anniversary. It’s been three years. Do you want the updated market? Because she said Not very many people were engaging after doing all that work. Like well, then maybe just say, Hey, are you interested in a current market report? I’d love to send one. Just shoot me back an email. Yeah, that way you’re opening dialog too. I like that, instead of you just automatically doing so much work. Now look, yes, someone from that list is going to be like, Hey, you didn’t send out that report this year. I love that report, but that’s easy. That’s the point. Who wants it and you have have started a conversation, so something like a home anniversary plan or a birthday plan. Are you hating sending out your birthday cards? Stop doing it. Yeah. Don’t do it. Just don’t do it. Or if you love it and you need a better plan, then come up with a better plan. Yeah. Okay. Like, how do you store those dates? Is it just in your Excel spreadsheet, or, like, in your Google Calendar, you can have a birthday and a home anniversary calendar, yeah, where you just turn off and then January, that would be the best way. I think that’s the best way. And then you pick the month, and whether you or an assistant or somebody sits down and quickly addresses all of those for the month. You can send them out every week, or just send it at the beginning of the month. Yeah, happy birthday month. I mean, what? Yeah, there’s the zero chance that you’re gonna send out the mail on exactly the right day. That shows up on their birthday anyway, at my house

Alissa 49:50
on the 21st I bought it on the 18th. Is this, they don’t even know. They don’t know. Okay, so store the date. The point is we put all this pressure on ourselves to do the. Big, grand things, no. And all they care about is just hearing from you. Yeah. They just want to be like, hey, right? Remember when I soldier your health, right? I don’t remember what month that was, but just hey, I was

Katy 50:12
so good. Remember, so great. The same with, like, your database, contact plan, like, what is the plan? And please stop making it so complicated, yes. And please stop, stop lying to yourself that you have to record every minute detail of what you do in your work.

Alissa 50:32
How do I remember what I talked about with them? Who cares? Yeah,

Katy 50:35
they’re not going to remember what you talked about either if you have to ask them what their dog’s name is. Again, I don’t think they’re gonna quit using you as their realtor. No, no, but if you call back and you say, oh my gosh, how’s Susie the puppy? She’s 18 months old, now, they’re gonna be like, You’re a weirdo, yeah, creeper. Why do you remember all that? Now I will say when I naturally have remembered things about someone, they have been like, wow, yeah, can’t believe you remembered that, and it feels special, but when it’s obvious that you recorded every detail of their last conversation. Yes, contrived, yeah. Like, I don’t, yeah, it’s weird. I don’t want someone to call me and make me feel like they remembered way too much about me. See, there’s

Alissa 51:17
things that are good to track, and then at some point you have to stop the madness. Also, the more

Katy 51:22
clients you have, the longer you’re in the business, the more people that are on your database, the more unrealistic it is to track this information. Yeah,

Alissa 51:30
I remember a top producer in my office saying that, like, her first few years of real estate, she really wanted to deliver a Christmas ham of the hams. And like, you know, the first year there’s like eight, and then the second year there’s like 20, and then, you know, by year three, she was like, I can’t do it. And then she can’t even fit these hams in the car, no. And then people were aggravated, like, where’s my ham? Where’s my ham. So you’re setting all these expectations, and you have to ask yourself, but long term, is this right? You need a non ham plan. Keep it very simple, very simple. Yes,

Katy 52:03
oh my gosh, that’s so funny. Okay, but so on your database plan, like, how are you going to track it? Maybe you don’t need to track it crazy, but when’s it going to happen? Like, are you going to try something new this year? You want to send video emails instead of writing up long, you know, letters, what? Maybe it’s just a fun time to try something new. Also, whatever you’re doing in your business should make you excited to do it. Yeah,

Alissa 52:27
you should be happy about it. Oh my god. I love saying today to have a little nerves, but you don’t need to be like, Oh my gosh. And

Katy 52:33
the response to it should also make you even more happy. So if you send out the coffee card to the people whose birthday it is, and then everyone is like, so excited about won’t that make you feel good? Yeah, like you should be enjoying that part of the process. Okay, next step on your plan list. What about your social media growth or awareness? What are you going to do this year on your social media? Nothing, fine, live your life like not going to tell you to do it. But do you want to try out reels or carousel post? Or maybe you want to figure out how to schedule your post. Or maybe instead of posting five days a week, you’re gonna back it down to three, yeah, or ramp it up.

Alissa 53:09
Your goal is to do a little bit less somewhere in some department, right?

Katy 53:13
Okay? Or maybe you’re gonna have a more specific plan for engagement. Instead of scrolling mindlessly for hours. You’re gonna talk to the people, yeah, for 20 minutes. Yeah, I like that. I plans. I like a good plan. And we’re gonna talk about this more this year. How do you collect emails from your social media? Yeah? Because that really is the goal of this. You need emails. And I want to give you all an example. Okay, okay. This is perfect for this episode. This is exactly when it happened. So I never remember we’re about to record an episode, and then I’ll think, Oh, shoot. I wish I could ask the people what their thoughts are on this topic, right? Yeah. So for in the past, I have just gone to the Instagram and been like, hey, drop your blah blah blah in this question box. Well, only this tiny little percentage of our followers see our Instagram post, right, right? So when, when I was preparing for this episode, I was like, oh, I need to go post on Instagram and get you know them to fill out the question box of what they’re going to revamp in their business. And then I’m like, Well, this is so silly, I’m going to just email it, because then it’s easier to track more people. Open the email, you can type it, yeah, y’all, there were over 100 responses to what on an Instagram post would have had five. I’m not joking, yeah, 10 tops. It was 10 times as many people responded and interacted. Yeah? Now imagine that in a real estate sense, right? You want to be on Instagram, and you talk to people who’s, you know needs tips for preparing their home for sale or whatever. Instead of that, you have an email list of people who fail you because of real estate. And then you’re like, hey, check out this interesting loan program I just heard about. Yeah. And then, great. Yeah, the people read the email. The people did not see your Instagram post

Alissa 55:05
correct. The whole point is to get an email right. So what are you doing, right?

Katy 55:10
Okay, so that’s, that’s the plan we’re gonna focus on this year. We’re gonna, we’re gonna talk more and more and more and more

Alissa 55:15
about that, even revamping your marketing plan for your listing. Oh, yeah, the market is different than it was last year. You may need to, maybe you didn’t have a marketing plan last year. May need to dust off the old books and see what did I do before things were just the plan? Yes. What is the plan? How am I? How am I communicating with my current clients on a regular basis? You know you need to have that because if you, if you don’t have a plan, the days will slip by, and then it’s been, like two weeks Exactly. That’s embarrassing and

Katy 55:45
and then then you are uncomfortable reaching out, yes, like, oh, sorry, Mr. Seller, nothing’s happening, and I’m pretending like you don’t exist, and you’re mad at me, right?

Alissa 55:54
You have to make sure that you have a time to follow up with your existing clients, or people that said that they were thinking about it, your prospects list, like all of that, they need to be intentional, right?

Katy 56:04
What’s the plan is that a certain part of your, you know, would be great if, on your office day you just had, like, a go to top five quick data, you know, 10 minutes of database, 10 minutes of follow it. Like, just, just, you don’t forget. Like, I think what happens is we get stuck, focused on one thing, yes, and we forget that. It doesn’t take a lot of work, but you do have to kind of hit a few different things, right? You got to hit your current clients, all right? Mr. Sellers, is what’s going on. You have to hit your data with people. Hey, how are you

Alissa 56:30
in this exercise has shown how much we do

Katy 56:34
before we have even begun to try and help someone buy or

Alissa 56:38
sell a house. This is just so much to keep up with. It’s

Katy 56:42
a business. It’s a business. If you do these things, you have to do these things, not all of them, but you do have to do them all right. So you got your Oh, and then do you have a marketing plan you want to fix up for, for maybe farming or, like, some type of and that

Alissa 56:55
kind of like, what do you think your goal, business wise, is your goal to really work your geographical area, right? Or is it to really work like a certain like, be really involved in the kids school or your church, yeah? Or, you know, a civic organization, like, what? What do you want? Where do you want to put your focus? Because

Katy 57:15
you can make a difference, yeah, if you focus on something

Alissa 57:19
consistent and intentional, so you have to make conscious decisions. I

Katy 57:23
think this is also a great time to audit what marketing you were already doing, or maybe you have forgotten about. Maybe it’s, this is the year you don’t renew the park bench, right? You know, right? Maybe this is the year you cancel that credit card so that everything doesn’t go through automatically. And you’re like, Oh no, Billboard, man, I don’t want to renew, yeah, or maybe you don’t want to be featured in that magazine. At the there’s always, like, a random one, like, Would you like to be featured in this golf club magazine? And I’m like, I don’t even live near there. Like, right? No. Or on the grocery cart? I know Aaron’s gonna laugh because she does her grocery cart, you know, Erin O’Brien, oh yeah, because her mom was always on it for years and years and years. She just wants to but like, maybe you’re on the grocery cart and no one has ever contacted

Alissa 58:06
you from the grocery cart. Sure, maybe this year, let’s take it off

Katy 58:10
target, let it go. Maybe we don’t need to be on the grocery cart. Mm, hmm, okay. Oh, and maybe now is a great time to brush up on some skills. Yeah, time to negotiate.

Alissa 58:20
Take some class pricing. Get your CE done early, yeah? Get it done in January. Katie,

Katy 58:26
maybe I will do that, because I certainly didn’t do it last year. Yeah? So, like, maybe it’s just time to brush up on some of your skills, you know, plan how you’re gonna learn this year. Maybe you have something that you already purchased, that you wanted to do, and you never did it like, I have a time management class that I’m going to go back to, okay? So, you know, maybe there’s something that you’re like, oh, yeah, you know what? I don’t need something new. I already have these things. Yeah, I need to finish what I started already invested in these things. Yeah, let’s figure out the things that I’ve already invested in, right, right? Yeah. That is a really thorough list,

Alissa 59:01
so thorough,

Katy 59:02
it really brings to light so much, and specifically that there’s a lot to running a business in real estate. So much,

Alissa 59:10
so much. Yeah, keep it tidy,

Katy 59:14
right? If you’re brand new and you haven’t even done any of a lot of these things,

Alissa 59:18
kind of envious of those people like to start from scratch, because

Katy 59:22
you don’t have to go figure out what websites your old photos on. You just need a place where you are recording, where you put the photo,

Alissa 59:30
going forward, oh gosh, like what? How nice it would be. Imagine

Katy 59:35
you go to change brokers, and you know exactly where your photo is, exactly where your bios are just, I think keeping those business assets in that, that list of kind of where, like your business parts and pieces in one place or somewhere that you can easily find is huge, yeah, and we’re just sort of all over the place, unfortunately, yes. So

Alissa 59:58
it’s, it’s no easy task. Like I will say, once you do the overhaul, yeah, if you can just have the office day to keep up with things, it makes it so much easier, so much this year was the easiest year to make sure my database was up to date. I thought I did pretty good throughout the year, but just keeping up with adding people after closing, I did the same thing. It wasn’t as bad as it was in the past. Yeah? So,

Katy 1:00:26
well, I think that’s great. Do you have any final parting words on sprucing?

Alissa 1:00:30
No, I think you should just enjoy it. Yeah? I think it should make you feel good and happy and light. Well, right?

Katy 1:00:36
Just like when you point anything, yeah, you’re like, oh, look, I feel better about this. So much better. You’re not gonna do all of these things ever, or today or tomorrow, like, just pick a few. Yeah, what are the things that are annoying you the most? Start with those. Like, my desk is such a mess, I’m gonna clean the desk, or I need to empty out my files. Yeah, I feel like it doesn’t take much to make an impact on your mental health. Oh, I did

Alissa 1:01:00
want to end Yes, oh, please for sure. Um, James clear quote, oh, we’re fab. Because I think a lot of this too, you may want to go back and listen to Done is better than perfect, like the problem with perfection, problem with perfection. Yeah, that one’s so good. Because we think I’m not even going to start this because I don’t have all day to just finish it. Like, if I can’t do it all, I don’t want to do any of it, yeah, like, I’m not even going to start until I can just what is James going to tell us? It only takes five minutes to break the cycle, five minutes of exercise and you are back on the path. Five minutes of writing and the manuscript is moving again. Five minutes of conversation, and the relationship is restored. It doesn’t take much to feel good again.

Katy 1:01:48
Oh, it doesn’t take much just do a little bit, just a little, just a little, oh, I love that. Why is he such a genius? He’s so good. Okay. Are you ready for a toes, yeah. Also, friends, people did tag us and tag James clear to try and get him on the show.

Alissa 1:02:05
I know we appreciate that. Y’all keep working on keep telling James who needs to come on the hula Hulu podcast. Keep tagging

Katy 1:02:10
James. He is a genius. Okay, so today’s toast comes from Danielle Miller to Nancy Fitzgerald, okay, okay, they’re both in the Philadelphia area, and let’s see what we’re gonna say about Nancy. Hold on. I gotta, like, figure out how to read this on this document. What row? Hold on. I gotta turn it this way. I think, well, we’ll get there. Okay. At heart, Nancy is a true creator of community and an agent and an agent by trade, she started and continues to lead the new agents cohort at our company, and has turned us new agents, as well as many seasoned agents onto your podcast. Oh, your podcast episodes are now referenced often in our cohort and throughout whole company emails. Whole company email, wow. And the topics you cover are so helpful and interesting, even for agents from a completely different market. We’re there in Philadelphia. Okay, thank you. And thanks to Nancy. That’s Well, Nancy, that’s the best we love when you guys share, and that’s she’s taking care of her other agents in our office. Yeah, that’s I love that. So cheers to Nancy. Thank you to Danielle, and good luck to all of you with the beginning of 2023 Yes. Happy sprucing. Spruce it up. You should have some time, right? Yes. Nice, quiet, slow part of the season. Spruce it up.

Alissa 1:03:40
Yes, make it. Go. Enjoy, enjoy. Goodbye. Thank you so much for tuning in to the hustle humbly podcast. If you enjoyed this

Katy 1:03:47
episode, please go to rate this podcast.com/hustle humbly, and leave us a review or drop a comment if you’re listening on Spotify,

Alissa 1:03:54
if you have an episode topic or someone you’d like to toast on the show, please email us at team at hustle humbly podcast.com, find

Katy 1:04:01
us on social media at hustle humbly podcast, don’t forget to find all of the free resources at hustle humbly podcast.com/resources,

Unknown Speaker 1:04:10
see you next week. This

Unknown Speaker 1:04:11
is the good life you.